


We'll Get Better

by unfolded73



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Smut, Past Abuse, Pre-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-29
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-05-15 06:42:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14785448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unfolded73/pseuds/unfolded73
Summary: Gamora struggles to start a physical relationship with Peter.





	We'll Get Better

**Author's Note:**

> This fic references Gamora’s past abuse, but not any specifics. This fic as as slow burn as you can get in a one-shot, I guess. Set shortly after GotG Vol. 2. No mention of the events of Infinity War. 
> 
> Posted [here](http://unfolded73.tumblr.com/post/174356949605/well-get-better-11-starmora-ff) on tumblr, if you'd be so kind as to reblog it there if you like it.

She struggles with being touched. Gamora doesn’t want to admit her failings, but really, that’s what it comes down to. The touch of a person’s hand on her skin, no matter how funny and kind and (ugh) sweet that person might be, triggers a fight or flight response. After so many years of torture, so many years when even a supposedly fatherly touch could turn cruel at a moment’s notice, her body is hardwired to react badly when someone touches her.

Gamora is brooding on this fact when she feels a tug at the bottom of her pants and the slightly sharp prickle of Groot crawling up her leg. When he’s high enough, he points to her pocket.

“I am Groot?”

“I don’t have any more candy, Groot; I’m sorry.”

“I am Groot,” he mutters as he hops back to the floor, glaring at her.

“Well, you ate it all, so that’s _your_ fault,” she says in response to his snark.

The problem she has with touching doesn’t apply to Groot. He’s a tree, and the sensation of his roots clambering up her clothes so that he can perch on her shoulder is familiar and if anything, soothing.

It’s not that she hasn’t allowed Peter to touch her; she has. She’s let him pull her into a dance, one of his warm hands in hers and the other chastely resting on her hip. She even went so far as to put her arm around him in comfort after Yondu died, the tense bunch of his muscles firm under her palm. 

(She thinks about those moments more than she wants to admit.)

Now their “unspoken thing” is slightly less unspoken but still unacted upon, and she’s aware of Peter searching for openings — for chinks in her armor. Eating a meal together on the Milano is an excuse for him to let his fingers graze hers as he passes a dish. A brief goodnight, and he trails his hand along her waist as he squeezes past her in the corridor. They are welcome bits of contact, and yet they aren’t. She wants him to touch her, but every time he does, she feels it jangling along her nerves like an ear-piercing scrape of metal on metal.

Day after day passes, and it feels like electrical potential is building between them, like she’s one of those damned Anulax batteries Rocket felt compelled to steal, and maybe if the electricity is discharged there will be a spark, or maybe she’ll just fucking explode. Probably the latter. 

When Peter suggests they spend a few days on a nearby leisure planet after they’ve foiled a plot by space pirates to hijack the transport vessel of an Elani princess, which was after they prevented a global pandemic by blowing up a haven of bioterrorists on Maarin III, which was after the incident with Peter’s father Ego, Gamora is just exhausted enough to say yes without putting up even a token argument. She doesn’t sleep as many hours a day as the others, but even Gamora is fantasizing about a soft bed and the oblivion of sleep by the time the Milano docks and they’ve found rooms at a hotel. Which is why when a hotel room key is pressed into her palm by the conciliatory front desk attendant, she pays no attention to where anyone else is going, she just drags herself to the room number appearing in little winking, electronic numbers on her key. It’s possible that she’s asleep before her head even hits the incredibly soft pillow.

It’s about three hours later when Gamora blinks her eyes open, struggling in the darkened room to remember where she is. The sound of snoring makes her sit up and look over toward the direction of the noise.

“Peter.” 

The snoring continues unabated.

She reaches over and punches him in the arm. “Peter.”

He startles awake, blinking slowly. “Huh? Gamora, wha—?”

“What are you doing in my room?” 

“It was either this or share with Drax and Mantis, and you know how Drax talks in his sleep.” He sits up and looks at the wide expanse of bed between them. “It’s a big bed, and you were so dead to the world, I had to check to see if you were still breathing. I figured you wouldn’t mind.”

“Just because I don’t wheeze like a Vrelnexian boar doesn’t mean I’m dead.”

He frowns like he is struggling to follow her words. “I know, I was just… wait, are you saying I snore?”

“Is that what you were doing? Because it sounded like—”

“Okay, okay. Sorry if I woke you up.” He looks contrite, with a line from the pillowcase pressed into his cheek and his hair sticking up on one side. Gamora smiles in spite of herself.

“It’s okay; I think I’ve slept enough,” she says. “But you haven’t.” She starts to stand up. “Why don’t I—”

Peter grabs her hand, and Gamora flinches. “No, stay. Please? Keep me company.”

She extracts her hand from his. “And what am I supposed to do while you sleep?”

He flops back on his pillow with a grin, letting his eyes fall closed. “I happen to know I’m adorable while I sleep; you won’t be able to take your eyes off me.”

Gamora snorts a quick breath out through her nose. “Right.”

Peter’s eyes slowly open, and he’s watching her carefully like he’s trying to read her mood. He sighs. “If you wanna be alone—”

“No, it’s fine.” And it _is_ fine, even though she’s feeling a little bit out of sorts, thrown by this strange intimacy of sharing a bed while not actually _sharing a bed_ in the euphemistic sense. She rolls her eyes at her own hangups. After all, both of them are still completely clothed. Peter was likely as exhausted as she was, just looking for a quiet place to rest. “I’m glad you’re here,” she blurts.

His face goes on a journey, first blooming with a cocky smile and then shifting into something softer and sweeter. “I’m always glad to be with you, ‘Mora.”

The room is terribly quiet; even the hum of the air conditioner almost undetectable to her ears. Her hand rests between the two of them on the bed, and Peter reaches over and runs the pad of his index finger across the top of her hand, the pink of his skin against the green hue of hers. She focuses on breathing and on staring at the contrast of their skin tones and on not flinching.

Perhaps she isn’t so successful at the not-flinching, because he draws his hand back and frowns.

“Sorry,” Peter says.

“It’s not you. I’m not…” Gamora reaches up and smooths her hair down, trying to cover a slight tremble in her hands. “I’m not good with physical interaction. With anyone.”

“Seemed pretty good at it the first time we met, when you kicked me in the face,” he says with a smile.

She laughs. “ _That_ kind of physical interaction, I’m good at. It’s what I was built for. The rest of it… it makes my skin crawl most of the time.”

“Jeez. Sorry.” She can immediately see the hurt in his eyes at the idea that he’s been causing her discomfort and she hasn’t said anything. “You should have told me before, I wouldn’t’ve—”

“I didn’t tell you because I… I want to get over it. I want to be able to…”

“To what?” he asks after a short pause, a little bit too eagerly.

Gamora smirks. “You know what.”

“I mean, I _hope_ , but I don’t _know_.”

She meets his eyes. He has kind eyes. Even when she thought he was a complete ass, she’s always thought he has very kind eyes.

“You’d be better off with someone else. Someone less difficult.”

“I don’t want anyone else,” Peter says, and the sincerity in his voice flattens her.

Gamora leans over him, resting her hand gently on his cheek, the stubble of his beard prickling against her palm. They stare at each other.

“You’re touching me,” Peter finally says, his voice a little raspier. The sound of it makes her feel… it makes her feel something she’s afraid to name.

“Yes.”

“Is it bothering you?”

“Not just now.”

“Good.” She sees his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows.

“You’re going to get frustrated with me. You’re going to want more than I can give,” she whispers.

He just shakes his head fondly, as if she’s ridiculous for even thinking such a thing.

“You’re so different from when we first met,” she says.

His eyebrows rise and fall quickly. “Kind of a lot has happened since then.”

Her hand is still resting on his cheek, and she wants to drop it away. She wants to pull him closer. She doesn’t know what to do, and it makes her feel like jumping up and punching the wall. It makes her want to run away as fast and as far as she can.

“Do you wanna sleep a little longer, maybe?” Peter asks.

It breaks the tension, and Gamora smiles, finally removing her hand from his face. “I know _you_ do.”

“Will you lie here with me?” His voice is soft and vulnerable and makes it feel like her heart is swelling inside her ribcage.

“Yeah.” She lies back on her pillow, on her side so that she’s facing him. Peter mirrors her, and their knees bump together as they curl up. Gamora watches him carefully, uncertain what the rules are for whatever they’re becoming.

Peter seems to read her mind. “We can go at whatever pace you need to. And if I ever do anything or say anything that makes you feel uncomfortable, please tell me, okay?”

“Okay.”

“And just so you know, anytime you wanna touch me, you should totally go for it.”

Gamora rolls her eyes. “No pressure then.”

He winces. “No, I don’t mean I’m, like, starving for it or anything.” She just raises a skeptical eyebrow at that. “Okay, maybe I’m a little starving for it, but it’s not like I can’t wait. I can wait, I promise.”

Blowing out a breath, Gamora closes her eyes. “Go to sleep, Peter.”

He stifles a groan. “Sorry I’m so bad at this.”

She opens her eyes again. “You don’t need to apologize. We’re both pretty bad at this, I suppose.”

“We’ll get better at it, though,” Peter mumbles, already starting to drift off.

Gamora tucks her hand underneath her face and watches as he falls asleep.

He is pretty adorable when he sleeps, she thinks to herself.

~*~

The drinks Drax keeps putting in front of her are strong, Gamora thinks as she squints her eyes and tries to make the two copies of Rocket she’s seeing coalesce into one. They aren’t paying for anything; a Xandarian duke recognized them, and announced loudly, “Your money’s no good here, Guardians of Xandar! Anything they want, it’s on me!”

She is sitting close to Peter in the booth, shoulders and hips pressed together. It’s nice, she thinks, the warmth of him all along her side. Why did she ever think touching him was bad? Touching him is _fantastic_.

He’s got his arm slung along the back of the booth behind her, and suddenly that’s all she can think about, his arm. His strong, well-muscled arm, and what it would feel like if he wrapped it around her.

Peter is laughing at something Mantis said, but between that conversation on one side of her and whatever Rocket and Drax are arguing about on the other side of her, Gamora can’t seem to make any of the words swirling around make sense. Groot runs around on top of the table, using his vine-like arms to vault from the table to Rocket’s shoulder to the top of Drax’s head, then back to the table. Gamora just manages to pick her drink up before Groot barrels into it. She takes another sip, the sweet and sour flavor filling her mouth, and shifts her hand under the table from resting on her own thigh to resting on Peter’s.

His attention shifts immediately, and he swings his head around toward her. His lips look soft, she thinks, and she wonders what they would feel like on her skin.

“Hey there,” he says with a lazy smile. 

“Hey.” Her voice sounds weird to her ears. Low and raspy.

She wants him to kiss her.

It’s ridiculous that they haven’t kissed yet, she muses. They’ve both admitted they have feelings for each other. Well, sort of. Not in so many words, but still. The information is out there. It’s shared information. Everyone else just assumes they’re a couple. Rocket has taken to calling Peter her “boyfriend” in that sly, snarky way of his, and Gamora doesn’t bother to dignify those comments with a response. Or maybe she doesn’t deny it because it’s basically true.

Or it would be true if she let him kiss her.

“Let’s go back to the hotel room,” she says to him.

Peter arches an eyebrow. “Are you tired?”

She lets her eyes drift down to his lips. “No.”

His other eyebrow joins the first one, his eyes wide. “Oh.”

Gamora turns and shoves Drax’s shoulder, prodding him to let her out of the booth. As she stands (and attempts to keep from tipping over to one side; those drinks were _strong_ ), Drax seems to take notice of the fact that she and Peter are leaving together.

“Are you two going to have sexual intercourse?” Drax asks.

“No! What? No!” Peter says quickly, even as his eyes drift to Gamora with a questioning glance.

“We’re just tired,” Gamora says evenly. “Don’t get into too much trouble tonight.”

“I plan to drink more,” Drax says. “And then find someone to fight.”

“That’s exactly what you shouldn’t do,” Gamora says.

“Watch out for him, will ya?” Peter asks Rocket.

“Yeah, yeah,” Rocket responds in his perpetually annoyed tone of voice.

Gamora leads the way toward their hotel, and she can feel Peter on her heels like she’s developed a sixth sense for his precise presence in three-dimensional space. He catches up to her side after they go through the revolving doors, boots loud on the marble floor of the lobby. She can feel him eyeing her, and her cheeks heat up in reaction.

They don’t speak until they’re inside their hotel room, the bed they innocently slept in the night before looming.

“So,” Peter says slowly, drawing out the word. “What did you want to—”

“Kiss me.”

He gulps. Actually literally gulps. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

“‘Mora. Are you—”

She pounces then, their mouths colliding a little bit painfully in a kiss that at first is as much teeth as lips. Then it settles into something softer, and she feels a tug on her bottom lip as Peter nips at her, his hands settling on her hips.

Her head is foggy with the alcohol, dulling her senses enough that she can relax and let this happen. Kissing him is nice. She likes the way his mouth tastes. She likes the warm, wet slipperiness of it, likes the sensation of his tongue in her mouth. Gamora grips his biceps and lets herself be carried along by the wave of feeling.

When they finally separate, Peter rests his forehead against hers, his breath panting out over her lips.

“Wow,” he whispers.

“Yeah.” She feels desire for him almost like a weight in her abdomen, and she reaches for his belt as she kisses him again.

“Woah, Gamora, hang on,” he says against her lips, taking a step back and making her stumble. “What exactly are we doing?”

She smirks. “I would think of all people, I wouldn’t need to explain it to you.”

“Yeah, but… I thought you needed to go slow.”

“Not right now, I don’t.” She takes a step toward him, resting her hands on his chest. 

Peter’s eyes sharpen. “Because you’re drunk.”

“Which is why I can finally let go without being hung up on all my…” She steps back again and gestures helplessly, searching for the words.

“Your years and years of trauma and abuse?” he supplies.

“Yes.”

“Okay, but do you see how that puts me in an impossible position? How do I know that you really want to do this?” His voice is plaintive. “What if I do something that triggers you? I don’t want to hurt you, baby.”

She bristles at the rejection and at the infantilizing endearment. Underneath that, she just feels terror. Terror that this is never going to work, and that Peter is going to tire of her. “I can take care of myself,” she spits. “I don’t need to you coddle me.”

“I know you don’t.” He reaches for her arm, and she shakes his hand off. “Gamora, I… I’ve never felt about anyone the way I feel about you. I just… I want us to be sober, for one thing.”

“And what if I can’t do that?” She feels like crying, which makes her even more furious — with herself, with him, with this whole stupid situation. They’re a man and a woman who want each other; there should be nothing simpler. Why does it have to be so complicated? “What if I can never do that?”

Tentatively, he moves to put his arms around her and she lets him hug her, her anger seeping away. “I don’t believe it’ll be never. I really don’t.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m sexually irresistible.”

She shoves him hard enough to make him stumble back, both of them laughing.

“I’m gonna get you some water and a headache tablet,” he says, turning toward the bathroom.

“I don’t have a headache,” she calls.

“You will tomorrow.”

She actually won’t; alcohol doesn’t affect her that way and never has. But it’s a sweet gesture, and so she dutifully swallows the pill and the glass of water when he brings them to her.

They get ready for bed silently, actually changing into pajamas this time. Or in Peter’s case, a t-shirt advertising a Xandarian brand of beer and underwear. She’s seen him wandering around the Milano like that often enough that she shouldn’t find it remarkable, but tension still hangs between them like a tangible thing, and she can’t help cutting her eyes over to his bare legs as she brushes out her hair.

When they climb into bed, bodies turned toward each other, the tension remains.

“I’d like to kiss you again,” Gamora admits. She’s also starting to sober up, the blanketing clouds thinning to expose her anxiety at being this close to another person, to being this vulnerable. She tries to mentally close a door on the anxiety. It mostly works.

“Okay,” Peter says a little breathlessly, scooting closer to her, his face so close she can’t focus on it. His hand comes up to touch her face, his thumb tracing along one of the silver mods in her cheek. With a shudder, Gamora presses her lips to his.

He’s a good kisser, she has to admit as she lets herself relax into him, their mouths open and searching. His hand remains gentle on her head, guiding the angle and rhythm of it. Gamora shifts a leg against him and feels his erection brush against her through his underwear. She pulls away, overwhelmed and anxious and more than a little aroused.

“Sorry,” Peter gasps. 

“Don’t be sorry,” she says. “I’m not… physically unaffected.” But she puts some distance between them.

“Yeah, but the way you get physically affected is way more subtle,” he says. “Unless there’s something about your species that I’m unaware of. Which I’m totally cool with, by the way.” 

She smiles, looking down at her body. “No, I’m pretty similar to most female species in this quadrant. I don’t think you’d find anything… unexpected.”

He rolls onto his back, putting an arm behind his head. “Hey, what did you mean, of all people you wouldn’t have to explain it to me?”

Gamora squints, trying to remember what he’s talking about. “When did I say that?”

He huffs. “Never mind.”

Their earlier conversation comes back to her then. “I think I meant that it seems like before we knew each other, you fucked your way across the galaxy.”

He winces but doesn’t deny it. “A lot has happened since then.”

“Yeah.”

~*~

“This is nice,” Mantis says.

Gamora turns her head on her reclined deck chair to look at her companion. Both of them are stretched out next to a large swimming pool, eyes shaded with sunglasses and bodies clad in new swimming clothes they decided to splurge on. Gamora doesn’t think she’s ever been this close to naked in public before. It’s disconcerting, but also strangely freeing at the same time. It makes her very aware of her body. For that matter, she’s felt very aware of her body since they got to this leisure planet, and no more so than this morning, waking up in Peter’s arms.

“Yeah,” she agrees. “Nice.”

“I’m glad you and Peter are together,” Mantis says. “I can tell you make each other happy.”

“When you say it like that, it sounds so simple,” Gamora says. “I wish it were that simple.”

“It’s not?”

Gamora sighs. She already feels flayed open, the way she’s been sharing her feelings with Peter recently. Now Mantis sits there looking at her, expecting Gamora to confide in her too. It’s exhausting.

“I grew up being tortured by Thanos, being turned into a weapon. Being touched meant being hurt. Sex, the few experiences of it that I’ve had, was just another weapon. A way to get information. A way to make someone vulnerable so that I could hurt them. I have no idea how to be… intimate with someone I care about. I’m not sure I can be.”

Mantis looks at her with sympathy. “I might be able to help you.”

Gamora’s eyes widen. “Yeah, thanks, but I’m not sure a threesome with you and Peter is what I’m interested in.”

“Oh!” Mantis giggles. “No, I wasn’t offering to be there in the room with you. I just mean I could…” She gestures vaguely at Gamora’s head. “You’re making an association between physical closeness and bad things that happened to you in your past. It’s a connection being made in your brain. I could suppress that.”

Sitting up, Gamora swings her legs over the deck chair and puts her bare feet on the ground. “Really? How long would that last?”

Mantis shrugs. “I don’t know. It depends on how strong the association is. But we could repeat the process as many times as you need, and eventually, your mind will make new connections. It will connect being close to Peter with good things. Safety. Comfort. Sexual pleasure—”

“Yeah, okay, I get it,” Gamora interrupts, uncomfortable. But, she has to admit, also excited.

Giving her a reassuring smile, Mantis pulls off her sunglasses and holds up her hands to either side of Gamora’s head. “So do you want to try it?”

~*~

“Gamora?” Peter calls as he unlocks the door to their hotel room. “What did you need?” She’d left Mantis at the pool and contacted him using their comms, telling him to meet her here.

She stops her pacing and turns, watching him walk in and seeing the minute he registers the bikini she’s wearing. “Whoa, ‘Mora, you look…” He blinks a few times, looking her up and down.

Gamora feels her cheeks heat up, and she decides to cut right to the chase.

“I told Mantis about my problem with physical intimacy, and she did something to the inside of my head,” she blurts out.

Peter looks concerned now. “What did she do, are you okay?”

Gamora barks out a nervous laugh. “I might be better than I’ve ever been. She did something so that I wouldn’t associate you touching me with… with my past. I don’t know how it works exactly. I don’t know how long it will last. I don’t know _if_ it works at all, but there’s only one way to find out.”

One of his hands twitches. “You mean…”

She steps up close to him, her mouth an inch from his. “Yeah.”

Peter suppresses a groan as he kisses her, and she can feel his hands hesitate, hovering just above her lower back before he lets them settle carefully on her bare skin. Gamora gasps against his mouth.

“Okay?” he asks.

She kisses him again, letting her own hands wander over his shoulders. “Very okay.”

“God, you’re beautiful,” he mutters, his lips trailing down from her mouth to her jaw and then her neck. 

Reaching down for the hem of his t-shirt, she rucks it up, pulling away long enough to get it over his head. Peter blinks at her, still looking shocked, as if he can’t quite believe this is happening.

“Gamora, are you sure about this?”

She nods, guiding him over and pushing him gently. He collapses into a sitting position on the bed, and she straddles his thighs, hovering over his lap. “I’m sure.” His hands return to her back, and the anxious buzz that usually comes along with his touch isn’t there. She just feels… good.

There’s more kissing (a lot more kissing), and both of them groan when she lowers her hips enough to grind against the hard length of him. She can feel the wetness gathering between her legs as she seeks more of that delicious friction. 

“Do we need… um… I’ve had my shots, but if we need to use something, I could go get—”

Gamora shakes her head. Pregnancy won’t ever be in the cards for her, but she doesn’t want to tell that sad story now and derail their forward momentum. “I’m good.”

He kisses her again, his mouth hot and pliant against hers. “Okay.” Then he stops again. “You can say stop anytime, okay?”

“I’m not going to,” she says with a swivel of her hips.

“Yeah, but you can,” he groans, hands slipped down the back of her bikini onto her ass and pulling her more tightly against him.

“Thank you.” She puts her hands at either side of his face and pulls back to look at him. “You’re a good guy, Peter Quill.”

“Don’t tell anyone. I have a reputation to maintain.”

There is more writhing and deep, wet kisses, and eventually, he rolls her onto her back, her knees bracketing his hips as he settles on top of her. 

“This would be better if we were naked,” Gamora says.

“Fuck yes it would.” Peter’s up in an instant, pulling off his boots and socks and fumbling with his belt while he tries not to miss a second of Gamora slowly taking off her bikini. When she leans back on the pillows, completely naked, Peter trips over his pants and barely saves himself from collapsing onto the floor. She can’t help but laugh.

She looks him up and down when he’s also naked. “Not bad.”

He pounces on her, her legs spreading readily to accommodate him. “Not bad? That’s all you have to say, _not bad_?” He shifts his hips and grinds against her accurately, and Gamora moans.

The sound of her pleasure shifts his mood, and his mirth dissolves into something slower and more tender as he moves over to her side on the bed. Gamora frowns at him, confused. She thought it was happening, that he was seconds away from being inside her, and she’s suddenly worried that she did something wrong.

Peter seems to read her confusion. “I want to make sure this is good for you. Learn what you like.” His hand drags down to her stomach, fingers trailing over her abdominal muscles. “Is it okay if I touch you?”

Her stomach swoops with excitement and nervousness. She nods.

His fingers are calloused but soft on her sensitive skin, and Gamora lets her eyes fall closed and sinks into the pleasure of what he’s doing to her. The slick strokes make her hips rise to meet his hand, and she hardly recognizes the breathy moans that come out of her mouth. His fingers slide into her, but it’s not enough — she needs him, all of him, buried deep and joined with her. 

“Fuck, I want it too, baby,” Peter says, shifting back on top of her, and Gamora realizes that she must’ve spoken some of that out loud. She’d be embarrassed if she weren’t more aroused that she’s ever been in her life. 

He lines himself up and thrusts into her slowly, sinking a little bit deeper each time he carefully pistons his hips. She feels a slight burn as he stretches her, but that’s quickly lost in how amazingly good it feels. He’s touching her everywhere, his hips against the insides of her thighs and his chest pressing against her breasts, his mouth on her shoulder and his cock inside her.

It’s wonderful.

They find a rhythm together, bodies sweating as they both reach toward what they need, what they’ve needed for ages from each other. 

“You feel good,” Gamora whispers, inadequate words for the way he’s making her feel, his pelvis grinding against her at the apex of every thrust, nerves alight as he fills her over and over. 

“God, you too, you’re—” He grunts, seeming to be hanging onto control by a thread. “You’re perfect.”

Her orgasm steals over her without warning, a fire that licks out from her center and consumes her, her throat dry as she cries out with it. Peter’s teeth graze her shoulder as his thrusts speed up and then he’s coming too. She’d laugh at the silly-sounding stifled groan that comes out of his mouth if she weren’t still half out of her mind, pleasurable aftershocks making her twitch.

Carefully, he pulls out and collapses on his stomach next to her, sort of gasp-giggling with relief (she assumes). He turns his head and grins widely at her. “Gamora, that was amazing.”

She doesn’t want to inflate his ego any more than it already is, but she’s not sure if she’s ever felt this good in her life. “Yeah, it was,” she says. She rolls onto her side and lifts her arm and lets it sort of flop over onto his back in an attempt to caress him. This kind of boneless, sated feeling is completely unfamiliar to her.

“We owe Mantis big time,” Peter says.

Gamora chuckles. “I’ll be sure to tell her.” 

He groans. “Then she’ll tell Drax, and he’ll want details…”

“True.” Not that it matters; she knows she’ll be talking to Mantis about this anyway, because it’s not as if she’s permanently cured. Strangely, though, the thought of her friends knowing these personal details about them doesn’t bother her that much. They know because they care about her. About both of them. 

She’s feeling so good that for a moment she feels like she might blurt out something that she won’t be able to take back. That she might tell him that she loves him. Instead, she shoves him and says, “You’re not going to snore tonight, are you?”

He snorts. “Shut up.”

“Because I’m not going to share a bunk with you on the Milano if you snore.”

Peter’s eyes open at that. “You’d share a bunk with me?”

Gamora rolls onto her back. “Shut up.”

And he does, snuggling into her side, his hand trailing up and down her hip and thigh. She closes her eyes, relaxes, and enjoys his touch.


End file.
